What are the physical differences (External and Internal) between races?

To say that race is a social construct is quite false. Race is a particular set of physcal and cultural similarities shared by a group of people living in a geographical area.

I don't want this thread to turn into a race vs intelligence. I only want people to post differences that have concrete evidence (images, numbers, scientific facts etc.), so please post as much as you can provided you can back it up.

That aside, there are notable physical differences between whites and blacks; Blacks (Round Foreheads, wide nose, coiled hair, maxillary protrusion) Whites (Flat forehead, thin nose, straight hair, and straighter features)
but these are External differences, even if a black person went for plastic surgery and managed to change their features to match those of a white person perfectly, there still would be a difference inside their body?

What I'm trying to get to is that we focus on Physical External features of race but there are Physical Internal features too. There must be a difference in thyroid function, respiratory function, digestive function etc?, otherwise why would certain races be more prone to diseases? (Sickle Cell in African populations) changing your external apperance wouldn't change your succeptability to disease would it?

a reply to: depleteduranium92

Why look at the differences when we should be looking at what makes us all basically the same? a common ground where we can understand and respect each other and not look at physical differences which are not important at all really.
We all love our children no matter what race and are all human beings/great apes.
We are different only because of the place we were born.
I don't think any race have different insides than me, again it is more to do with the place you were born and that culture.
Oh and sickle cell isn't a disease it is a genetic (inherited) blood disorder.
Down the line we all have black/blue/yellow blood in us and no one is pure white/black etc.

a reply to: depleteduranium92

Here is my answer www.abovetopsecret.com...

I watched a brilliant documentary with Morgan Freeman on "Through The Wormhole" on this subject. Have a look at Series 3, episode 2 as it explains the difference in skin colour and other differences between races that have appeared through the millienas due to cultural and Enviromental factors.

originally posted by: depleteduranium92

I don't want this thread to turn into a race vs intelligence. I only want people to post differences that have concrete evidence (images, numbers, scientific facts etc.), so please post as much as you can provided you can back it up.

But you managed to somehow...

That aside, there are notable physical differences between whites and blacks; Blacks (Round Foreheads, wide nose, coiled hair, maxillary protrusion) Whites (Flat forehead, thin nose, straight hair, and straighter features)

Not backed up by concrete evidence as you said you wanted. I know many people that exhibit a mix and match of the above characteristics. They are not as cut and dry as you say.

What I'm trying to get to is that we focus on Physical External features of race but there are Physical Internal features too.

Why must we focus on any differences?

There must be a difference in thyroid function, respiratory function, digestive function etc?, otherwise why would certain races be more prone to diseases? (Sickle Cell in African populations) changing your external apperance wouldn't change your succeptability to disease would it?

Sickle Cell Anemia, a blood disorder caused by a mutation of hemoglobin. It has nothing to do with race. It has to do with the prevalence of malaria in the tropical regions where their ancestors lived. ie. yes africa, but also central and south america and southeast asia.
Source because you asked it to be back up.

So far it seems that everyone is so tied up with the 'Race Thing' that they don't want to answer. Says a lot about us as a species.

Interesting question OP. I don't know the answers to your thoughtful questions but I would be interested in others replies if we can get past the bit about talking about the very taboo subject.

I wonder why we are conditioned to see this as a taboo subject. Hell, sex is easier to discuss, nudity, not so much.

P

The only differences I've ever learned of are minor physical adaptations to the local environment which varies hugely globally when we consider people such as the bushmen of the Kalahari and the Inuit people of the polar region. Factors like diet and exposure to extreme heat or extreme cold produce evolutionary enhancements that make those peoples more suited to their locality's variations and extremes than those acclimatised over millenia to other regions.

Under all that, we're all humans with a common origin and therefore related as identified at a DNA level even though our external appearances may vary.

originally posted by: pheonix358
So far it seems that everyone is so tied up with the 'Race Thing' that they don't want to answer. Says a lot about us as a species.

Interesting question OP. I don't know the answers to your thoughtful questions but I would be interested in others replies if we can get past the bit about talking about the very taboo subject.

I wonder why we are conditioned to see this as a taboo subject. Hell, sex is easier to discuss, nudity, not so much.

P

Because our society worked really hard during the 60's-90's to end racism. My high school was integrated the first year I attended. I remember. We really tried to end racism.

And then, along came Jessie Jackson and his ilk who profited from it and found a occupation dependent on racism. I tried to attend his church but was told there was a charge as in $ to attend if you weren't a member. This was in the late 70's.

And now the Democrats who opposed ending slavery, were members of the KKK, are now promoting racism by calling everyone and his brother a racist.

Finally along comes what the country hopes will end racism, a black president, and turns out the president and his lackies get some sort of orgasm out of calling everyone that disagrees with his ideas, thoughts, and political stances racist.

We are sick to death of all this racism talk

after working so hard to end then

just to end up being accused of being racist at every turn in our lives.


And, as a professor of Human Development, I can tell you

race is a social construct, caused by hundreds of years of inbreeding, which can cause the characteristics the OP seems to relish, get over it,

The human race is like dogs - all of us, even the OP
there are internal and external differences between a great dane and a chihuahua
but they are both dogs
descended from wolves
and a dog is a dog
and a human is a human

END RACISM please, Democrats Liberals Progressives
there is not a racist boogie man around every corner
OP these "differences" can be seen in every single racial group in individuals.

Stop it

Now

There are no two animals of a single species genetically so similar then any random couple of Man currently alive on Earth.

I could link a whole bunch of sources that back me up, but I won't.

You've taken the first little step... Don't stop and deny ignorance !

Enjoy

Physically...

Blacks tend to have the smallest skulls and smallest brains, while Asians have they largest brains and skull cavities. Whites have feet adapted for swimming (flatter feet, like a paddle), while blacks have "snap" muscles in their legs similar to cheetahs that allow them to run fast from a dead stop. Blacks tend to have the largest genitalia, while Asians generally have the smallest. Blacks are better adapted to warmer weather, and whites are better adapted to cooler weather.

originally posted by: WP4YT
Physically...

Blacks tend to have the smallest skulls and smallest brains, while Asians have they largest brains and skull cavities. Whites have feet adapted for swimming (flatter feet, like a paddle), while blacks have "snap" muscles in their legs similar to cheetahs that allow them to run fast from a dead stop. Blacks tend to have the largest genitalia, while Asians generally have the smallest. Blacks are better adapted to warmer weather, and whites are better adapted to cooler weather.

I seriously almost pissed myself reading that.

a reply to: depleteduranium92

Race's are originally geologicaly isolated and culturaly isolated groups and over time there small differences are amplified in relation to there more distant cousin's.
This creates and even amplifies trend's in there gene's and for instance the japanes and korean's actually use the oposite hemisphere of the brain to the european's to process musical thought.
Of course this mean's there are neurological differences but basically everyone outside of africa has a common ancestor withing the past 140000 years traced back to east africa but inside the african continent which is actually huge there have always great natural barriers which have isolated different group's so there are at least seven distinct and seperate races in africa.
Markers in our genes can tell us a lot but they are not the whole story as cultural and diatery differences can also affect our neurology but generally we are tailored to specific environment's and conditions, darker skin is more resistant to solar radiation and lighter skin is more effective at making Vitamin D in with lower light level's, temporate climate races are more adapted to cold weather and resist frost bite more effectively due to skin surface micro blood vessels and of course those tailored to the more extreme climates such as the eskimo or the desert dwelling people of africa are physically different, the eskimo have lower surface area due to there compact body shape and the african tribes whom live on the semi desert are tall, thin and have higher surface area to there body giving them superior heat dissipation.
But at the end of the day we are all simply people and I do not care about a persons colour or race only there inner person and weather they are good or bad from my perspective.
The same if I see a beautiful woman and find she is not a nice person I actually lose all interest.

a reply to: depleteduranium92
I agree with the people saying we need to be race indifferent as much as possible and I've always tried to do that, in fact I've been commended by the company president for having a more racially diverse hiring record than other executives on his staff who he encouraged to be more like me when hiring. I actually had no intent of hiring for racial diversity, I was always trying to hire the best person for the job and I didn't care what race they were. It just kind of worked out that the most qualified people were racially diverse.

Of course the key to our makeup is in genetics, and we have at least scratched the surface on decoding the human genome; they say it's decoded, but I don't think we understand it yet, only parts of it.

What I found interesting was a science show about DNA where "that science guy" Michio Kaku, who I believe referred to himself as a Japanese American (His parents were Japanese immigrants and he was born in America), sent his DNA to the Genographic project to see if they could identify any areas that had high correlation with his genetic pattern, and they told him he could trace his genetic roots to Tibet.

Kaku, being a scientist found this scientifically fascinating because apparently he didn't know about the Tibetan roots of his DNA. I think it's perfectly fine to talk about genetic ancestry like this, and try to figure out human migration patterns, if we can just look at it scientifically and leave any bigotry out of it, however the problem is, there has been so much bigotry for so long that even scientifically valid discussions such as these can take on a toxic image. I think the Genographic project has valid scientific goals which interest me as they interested Kaku, but the project is not without controversy. Here is a little about the goals:

“The greatest history book ever written is the one hidden in our DNA.”
—Dr. Spencer Wells

The Genographic Project is a multiyear research initiative led by National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence Dr. Spencer Wells. Dr. Wells and a team of renowned international scientists are using cutting-edge genetic and computational technologies to analyze historical patterns in DNA from participants around the world to better understand our human genetic roots. The three components of the project are:

To gather and analyze research data in collaboration with indigenous and traditional peoples around the world
To invite the general public to join this real-time scientific project and to learn about their own deep ancestry by purchasing a Genographic Project Participation and DNA Ancestry Kit, Geno 2.0
To use a portion of the proceeds from Geno 2.0 kit sales to further research and the Genographic Legacy Fund, which in turn supports community-led indigenous conservation and revitalization projects

The Genographic Project is anonymous, nonmedical, and nonprofit, and all results are placed in the public domain following scientific peer publication.

Even though one of the non-profit goals is to use kit sales to support "community-led indigenous conservation and revitalization projects", some indigenous populations have objected to the project:

The Genographic Project

In May 2006, some indigenous representatives went to United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues (UNPFII) to contest participation in genetic testing. A spokesman said,

"The Genographic Project is exploitative and unethical because it will use Indigenous peoples as subjects of scientific curiosity in research that provides no benefit to Indigenous peoples, yet subjects them to significant risks. Researchers will take blood or other bodily tissue samples for their own use in order to further their own speculative theories of human history".

I can't say I understand the objections that it provides no benefit to indigenous peoples since that's one of the stated goals, and I think the risk of giving a small blood sample is pretty minimal, so I can only presume those are excuses and the real reasons for not wanting to participate remain unstated, which I don't know but can only guess may have something to do with fear of genetic/racial profiling or something?

Humans are not without emotion and on touchy topics like this, those emotions can get in the way of doing science.

originally posted by: boymonkey74
a reply to: depleteduranium92

Why look at the differences when we should be looking at what makes us all basically the same? a common ground where we can understand and respect each other and not look at physical differences which are not important at all really.
We all love our children no matter what race and are all human beings/great apes.
We are different only because of the place we were born.
I don't think any race have different insides than me, again it is more to do with the place you were born and that culture.
Oh and sickle cell isn't a disease it is a genetic (inherited) blood disorder.
Down the line we all have black/blue/yellow blood in us and no one is pure white/black etc.

does all you just said matter in the least if you need an internal organ matched and replaced? Or if you need a blood transfusion. Read the op. You got side tracked trying to make it about racism

a reply to: manna2

Having sickle cell disease, is a blood disorder, not a racial disorder. It is not specific to any one particular race, although it is commonly thought to.

Sickle cell trait is more common in certain ethnic groups, including:

African Americans (8 to 10 percent of African Americans have sickle cell trait)
Hispanics
South Asians
Caucasians from southern Europe
People from Middle Eastern countries

Hematologydotorg

The article further goes on to say:

All newborns in the United States are now tested for sickle cell disease and sickle cell trait.

Not just newborns of a certain race, or even from a certain genealogy stemming from the above list. All newborns.

a reply to: depleteduranium92

Real answer . . . there are no differences in humans, period. What you perceive as "race", is nothing more than a cultural expression of what features were important to their survival, success, or sexual attraction. The same traits can be manifest in any human, if the parental DNA shows the same expression.

Using the latest molecular biology techniques, Templeton has analyzed millions of genetic sequences found in three distinct types of human DNA and concludes that, in the scientific sense, there is no such thing as race.

"Race is a real cultural, political and economic concept in society, but it is not a biological concept, and that unfortunately is what many people wrongfully consider to be the essence of race in humans -- genetic differences," Templeton said. "Evolutionary history is the key to understanding race, and new molecular biology techniques offer so much on recent evolutionary history. I wanted to bring some objectivity to the topic. This very objective analysis shows the outcome is not even a close call: There's nothing even like a really distinct subdivision of humanity."

Templeton used the same strategy to try to identify race in human populations that evolutionary and population biologists use for non-human species, from salamanders to chimpanzees. He treated human populations as if they were non-human populations.

"I'm not saying these results don't recognize genetic differences among human populations," he cautioned. "There are differences, but they don't define historical lineages that have persisted for a long time."

Templeton's paper, "Human Races: A Genetic and Evolutionary Perspective," is published in the fall 1998 issue of the American Anthropologist, an issue almost exclusively devoted to race. The new editor-in-chief of the American Anthropologist is Robert W. Sussman, Ph.D., professor of anthropology in Arts and Sciences.

"The folk concept of race in America is so ingrained as being biologically based and scientific that it is difficult to make people see otherwise," said Sussman, a biological anthropologist. "We live on the one-drop racial division --if you have one drop of black or Native American blood, you are considered black or Native American, but that doesn't cover one's physical characteristics.

"Templeton's paper," Sussman continued, "shows that if we were forced to divide people into groups using biological traits, we'd be in real trouble. Simple divisions are next to impossible to make scientifically, yet we have developed simplistic ways of dividing people socially."

Source

In The Ancestor's Tale Richard Dawkins devotes a chapter to the subject of race and genetics. After an extensive discussion race, and how the term is not well defined, Dawkins turns to the genetics of race. Dawkins describes the relatively low genetic variation between races, and geneticists conclusion that race is not an important aspect of a person. These conclusions echo those of Lewontin, and Dawkins characterizes this view as scientific orthodoxy. However, Dawkins felt that reasonable genetic conclusions had been tainted by Lewontins politics. Dawkins accepted Lewontin's position that our perception of relatively large differences between human races and subgroups, as compared to the variation within these groups, is a biased perception and that human races and populations are remarkably similar to each other, with the largest part by far of human variation being accounted for by the differences between individuals. Dawkins' also agreed with Lewontin that racial classification had no social value, and was in fact destructive. Together with Edwards, Dawkins disagreed with Lewontin that this means race is of 'virtually no genetic or taxonomic significance' and summarized Edwards' point that however small the racial partition of the total variation may be, if such racial characteristics as there are highly correlated with other racial characteristics, they are by definition informative, and therefore of taxonomic significance. Dawkins went on to concludes that racial classification informs us about no more than the traits common used to classify race: the superficial, external traits like eye shape and skin color.

Anthropologists (such as C. Loring Brace), philosopher Jonathan Kaplan and geneticist Joseph Graves. have argued that while it is possible to find biological and genetic variation roughly corresponding to race, this is true for almost all geographically distinct populations: the cluster structure of genetic data is dependent on the initial hypotheses of the researcher and the populations sampled. When one samples continental groups, the clusters become continental; with other sampling patterns, the clusters would be different. Weiss and Fullerton note that if one sampled only Icelanders, Mayans and Maoris, three distinct clusters would form; all other populations would be composed of genetic admixtures of Maori, Icelandic and Mayan material. Kaplan therefore concludes that, while differences in particular allele frequencies can be used to identify populations that loosely correspond to the racial categories common in Western social discourse, the differences are of no more biological significance than the differences found between any human populations (e.g., the Spanish and Portuguese).

Source

a reply to: depleteduranium92

There really are not significant physical differences. You do have some genetic differences that come out in metabolism if different drugs for example and different genetic diseases, sickle cell vs cystic fibrosis for example.

The only key difference between races are in the racists in any given race.

The universal ignorance of racism alone shows that we humans are all more alike than different.

We have a bi-racial president.... He sucks as much as the white guy he replaced... Do we blame his white half or black half?

There is only one race...

The human race.

There are some differences. People of African descent tend to have longer limbs and higher centers of gravity which tends to make them better runners. it's not exclusive to Africans. I have the same characteristics. In general, if you look at people who tend to excel at running, they will be built this way, and in general, people of African descent will tend to be more likely to have the longer limbs leading to a higher center of gravity.

By contrast, People of European descent have both long limbs and long torsos at the same time. They don't run as fast, but it gives them an inside leg up on swimming. Asians are built the same way with longer limbs and torsos, but they are hampered a bit by tending to be naturally shorter then Europeans. However, if you've been watching the Olympics, the Asians are learning how to overcome the height disadvantage in the pool.

Of course, the important thing to remember is that these are just tendencies that we have due to coming out of populations that have been isolated and tending to interbreed. There are always individuals who get the characteristics needed to excel in a sport or physical pursuit in any ethnicity no matter what.

One measurable physical difference is that different races have different blood types. As far as I am aware, this has no real significance outside of blood donor clinics, however, but it is true nonetheless.

en.wikipedia.org...

There are other hereditary differences I am aware of; for instance, the sickle cell anemia already mentioned common in parts of Asia. I have also read that Africans have a higher incidence of heart disease. Looking up on the good old wiki again, someone has kindly compiled a nice chart here.

en.wikipedia.org...

I'm not sure whether these are the sorts of things you're looking for, but it's a start.